


all roads lead

by Anemoi



Category: Football RPF
Genre: (i think), (really really manchester united), (sorry stevie and God), Gen, Manchester United
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-16
Updated: 2016-02-16
Packaged: 2018-05-21 00:57:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6032347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anemoi/pseuds/Anemoi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>you and your band of Manchester boys.</p>
            </blockquote>





	all roads lead

**Author's Note:**

  * For [redandgold](https://archiveofourown.org/users/redandgold/gifts).



> for Rachel, except you know how i promised you like, a DEVILS FOOD CAKE WITH RED VELVET FILLING four score and twenty years ago? i fear this is more like 6 kitkats and a squished party streamer. i love you and i? tried?

 

 

 

_"...The empathy, connection and experience shared with them by virtue of loving United, of United being an intrinsic part of life and memory, something inculcated from an early age and always there, is a special thing. And more generally still, the empathy, connection and experience shared with them, in simply the being of friends."_

 

 

 

 

 

David, 2015

 

Your name is David Beckham, and your friends call you Becks. So does the world, half mockingly, half in adulation. _Be-cks._ It breaks cleanly in the middle, less than a heartbeat of silence in between the syllables, you are oh-so-familiar with it and its promise of comfort coming from the ones you love.

They called you other things too, you know this. Here are some facts: Your name is David Beckham and you used to play for Manchester United.

Here’s another: You couldn’t watch them play for two years after you leave.

- _you’re not sure how you did that, exactly, even afterwards, like pretending a part of your heart doesn’t exist, except you do know; you were always very good at that: Don’t turn on the TV, don’t read that news article, don’t wash your hands too often, don’t think about the boys you grew up with and left behind, don’t organize the fridge for the fourth time-_

Here’s a final fact: you’re back in Old Trafford and it’s raining.

It’s your charity match with all your friends playing - most of your friends- and you cross the ball without thinking, because you’ve never thought before and you couldn’t start now if you tried. You only reach back and pluck it out of your- (mind? soul?)- yourself, draw your leg back and bend, curve, kick.

- _What did they say? the rest is history. You know exactly why you left but you couldn’t explain even if you tried. Why does it always come back to this? You know exactly why you left but you need absolution anyway._

You see Paul arch up and head it in, and the past comes tearing open in one glorious instant, like a paper bag bursting, red blooming from where Paul’s running towards you now and coloring the entire world. Like you’ve been seeing black and white and now there’s color on the screen. You blink the rain out of your eyes (it’s just rain, isn’t it? liquid and warm), not looking for him because he isn’t here, and put your arms around the ones who are. Nicky’s hand on your shoulder, Paul’s hand in yours, Ryan smiling, Phil laughing by your side.

Later you’re the last one left in the changing room, ostensibly taking your time with the hair gel but just trying to stay as long as you can (you know every time is closer to the last). Phil’s still here too, frowning at his phone. The others are probably outside, gathered in a little conspiratorial huddle. It makes you smile imagining it.

“He would’ve been here if he could,” Phil says. You turn to look at him.  

“I miss him,” you say suddenly. Phil smiles quickly, like a sunburst. It reminds you of Gary and doesn’t at the same time, maybe just the barest shadow of his brother hidden at the corners of his mouth. They used to look more alike, you remember, way before.

“Then call,” Phil says, pats your knee and leaves you wondering.

 

You dial his number.

- _he understood who you were beneath all the dizzying vertigo of your fame because he was here first; surely it counts for something if you acknowledge that, if you keep it in your heart, surely it doesn’t matter that everything’s already said and done because you still have this, stated, sealed, unbroken._

“Becks?” Gary says, and the final piece of you falls into place.

 

-

 

Phil, 2016

 

Your name is Phil Neville, and you played for Manchester United and captained Everton. You’re Phil Neville, and you’re Gary’s brother.

It used to irk you, that. Not being his brother, obviously, because even at his worst you loved him and it took the sting out of everything he could’ve done and you could’ve perceived to be hurtful.

Here is a fact: You love Manchester United.

- _you’re two years younger but you’re better by far already, and this makes you happy because you love football, and you love United, easily admitted truths that you don’t even have to think about, and this means you are getting closer and closer to your dream. But you love Gary too, also thoughtlessly, and the way he looked sometimes, a flash of desperation in his eyes that’s gone in a blink, made you worry._

Here are some other facts: You left Manchester. You went to Merseyside. You went to Valencia after retiring.

Here is the last one: Valencia’s new manager is Gary Neville.

 

Paul phoned you once about two weeks after Gary moves to Spain.

“How’re you two doing?” he said.

It made you blink in surprise. _You two._ The Neville brothers, his dark to your light, you know Tracey is your twin but sometimes you look like your brother when you’re frowning at something in concentration. Only for a fraction of a second because no one can mistake you for him (or him for you) at all, but it’s there.

“Alright. Gaz’s settled in well.”

- _it’s not all about your brother, really. Your life, that is. There’s a lot of it that isn’t, but that’s like saying your life’s not all about football, or United. It isn’t. But they’re there, constant even when unseen. You want to begrudge him certain things because he’s always determined to be the best out of the two of you, not even bothering to hide it. You want to begrudge him, but you can’t, not with those memories of the evening settling darkly around the two of you in the Barracks, the way he held you together after 98._

 

There’s this prayer that you said before every match when you were still playing. After Camp Nou and the seven nil you remember this out of nowhere. It’s an obsolete prayer now, but you can make it work if you change a few phrases. This time Valencia is playing Espanyol at home, and it’s a last ditch hope. For him. Him standing brave under the anvil daring it to drop. Your big brother.

 _You’ll always live in your brother’s shadow_ they said, but when you see him standing there, unbent and steel straight on the touchline, hands tucked in his pockets and chin jutted still in defiance, you can’t see any shadow at all.

He turns and looks at you, a flash of anxiety in his eyes that’s gone in a blink. You give him the biggest smile you can muster, and start the words to the prayer.

 

-

 

Nicky, 2014

 

Your name is Nicky Butt, and you used to play for Manchester United until you couldn’t anymore. You’re a footballer and have always wanted to be, since you were a boy playing in the streets of Gorton, and so that wasn’t an outcome you haven’t foreseen. It wasn’t the worst outcome you imagined by far, even though- even though.

Here is a fact: You grew up in Manchester United.

- _you were the best of them all for a while and it was simple, because you never had to think about it, you’re you and you’re fearless. There is nothing that stands in your way that cannot be faced down. And it gets better than you thought: you meet a bunch of boys who thought the same way you did. Gaz with his constant nervy frown, Becks’ attention to detail, Scholesy and his quiet sarcasm, bright eyed Phil who came along later. And Giggsy._

 

Here is another fact: You go to Newcastle in 2004 after winning more trophies than many men dream of in a lifetime.

Here is the last one: You go back to Manchester after 8 years.

- _you meet Ryan when you’re 14 but you’ve heard of his reputation before. Everyone has, the boy wonder about to break into the first team. You’re skeptical before you meet him so you don’t say anything, waiting until he does. He just nods at you and your eyes meet for a moment- his eyes very wide as though he was about to start smiling, but he doesn’t. You feel something click in your chest. “Alright?” you ask, ignoring the hoarseness of your own voice, and then you see his mouth quirk up._

 

“You’re going to be my assistant manager,” Ryan announces through the phone. You grunt, and he starts laughing.

“What?”

“You might as well sound excited about it,” he says, not even a little reproachful. You make a noise of agreement. And he says, after a pause, “Do you think we’ll do alright?”

The season was a bust already. You stare out at your backyard and wonder what to tell him. You’re just a footballer, and you don’t even know everything there is to know about football. But you think about how even after you’ve pulled on the black and white, and Tyneside started to feel familiar, and the ocean stopped making you uneasy, that you still carried Manchester with you. It doesn’t unravel, this thing right in the very core of you, wound too tight to be comfortable and yet comforting nonetheless.

“We’ll do alright,” you say, meaning the rest of the season and the seasons to come after that, because you’re home now and he is too, and you know you’re here to stay.

 

-

 

Ryan, 2014

 

Your name is Ryan Giggs and you play for Manchester United. You have for so long that it seems like you always will, but that’s not true and you’re starting to accept it, resigned, waiting on the bench while the boys born before your debut stretch out their tense muscles by the touchline, before their numbers go up in lights.

Here is a fact: You love Manchester United.

_-you didn’t start with United but you’re going to end with them, you know this even as a 14 year old. You make your debut when you’re 18, and so it goes, writing history, you are brave and young and playing football with your best mates. This is a good story you’re living in, you know that, better than the ones you imagined as a very young boy. It was more like a daydream; you’re running down the curb on a street and laughing, thinking that any second now your feet will meet air and you’ll take off. You knew you were always just a finger’s length away from flying._

Here is another fact: You have won almost everything there is to win. Most of them more than once.

Here is the last one: You will always play for Manchester United.

You’re named player-manager for the last four games of the season and it bridges your fear very neatly. You don’t want to leave United (you never want to leave United, and you’ve never had to, and now here’s a promise of a future again) but this is so new it makes you reel. You’ve spent your whole life hurtling from fear to fear and it makes you happy because you want the challenge, you’re born for it.

You win against Norwich, but then you lose to Sunderland.  

- _you know that there’s more to life than football, or United, but you don’t really believe it. You know that it’s not enough to be just good at football, but you don’t really believe that either. You start off young and brave with all your friends around you until it’s just you left, blundering forward as the world narrows down darkly, blinking confused at the white in your hair. You cut it short but the white doesn’t go. You have to let go, but you can’t, because- without it you don’t believe in yourself either._

 

You show up at Paul’s at 2 in the morning the day before your last game. You suppose it says something that he opened the door and made you tea to boot. You don’t know why you came to Paul’s house either, except that he was the last to go, that fourteen years disappear when you ran to him to celebrate after a goal.

You drink your tea without speaking. He doesn’t say anything either. You leave and United draw against Southampton the next day, and you retire and become assistant manager. This is how your fortune goes, running from fear to fear, but now with the world brightening again and your friends back by your side.

 

-

 

Paul, 2012

 

Your name is Paul Scholes and you played for Manchester United until you retired. You’re going to play for them now, again, a year after you announced your retirement, and you suppose that sums up your career pretty well.

Here is a fact: you love football.

- _you don’t think when you play football, you look. This is quite simple for you but you have a feeling it isn’t for other people, that people don’t see what you see. It’s very simple, actually, the way the game ebbs and flows and the ball at your feet and the challenge is just to get it to where it has to be next. Everyone else was very good too, Ryan and Butty and Becks, so you never thought about it. Football was simple. Everything surrounding it was not._

 

You call Gary to tell him about your decision.

“I’m not coming back,” he says promptly. “I’m done.”

You would roll your eyes but he couldn’t see, so there’s no point there. “I didn’t say anything.”

“Giggsy would be pleased,” Gary says after a pause.

“Yeah,” you say.

“Can you still fit into your shorts?” Gary asks. Now you roll your eyes but you’re smiling too, even though he couldn’t see.

 

Here are some facts: you love Manchester United, but you haven’t quite realised it till you’re wearing 22 again and running on to the pitch. Love isn’t a word that you actually think about often, but there it was, nonetheless.

Here is the last one: Gary Neville is your best friend.

- _Ryan would always be the best player you know but something about Gary still sticks with you. It’s how hard he works at football, you tell yourself, but it’s probably how he looks after finding his car keys that you hid behind one of the lockers. Like he was going to blow his top and start laughing at the same time. It’s probably that, the skinny boy shivering next to you in the academy after one of the ritual humiliations, the stark raving mad boy with fiery brown eyes who swears he’s going to be a Manchester United player one day. Maybe that’s when you fell in love with the club (with him), and you hadn’t even known it._

 

Phil called you up after you retire for the second, and final time. Butty and Becks sent texts. You’d seen Ryan that morning. You wait for the phone to ring without really waiting, because football was simple but nothing else ever is. He calls anyway.

“Scholesy?” he says, and there’s so many things you want him to know and so many ways to tell him, but you settle for the simplest. It’s a gamble, you know, but you’ve always been very good at winning those; you, boy in the red shirt and the red hair.

“Gaz,” you say, and when he breathes in sharp you know you’ve won this, too.

 

-

 

Gary, 2011

 

Your name is Gary Neville and you’ve played for Manchester United your entire life. Today is your testimonial, and you have all your friends back, even Becks, the renegade son returned. You know you’re at the end now, but it breaks your heart, this inevitability. _This is the one,_ they sing, and you look to the stands.

Here is a fact: You love Manchester United more than anything else in the world.

- _you said that first as a five year old on the K-stand and you said it as a skinny apprentice shivering in an ice bath with your number marked out on your back in blood. You said it through the losses and you said it through the wins. You whispered it in the dark of hotel rooms and stadium tunnels, yelled it into the foreign mornings after nights of victory. This one thing you never doubted, steady and solitary as your own heartbeat in the exercise room as you recovered from your injuries, a firework in your chest when they stood up and clapped for you on your return in Old Trafford._

Here is another fact: You’ve gotten almost everything you’ve ever wanted in life. Almost.

Here is the last one: Even though it could never be enough, you know it is. It has to be, after all.

 

After the match the six of you sit around in the locker room and talk. Phil throws his dirty socks at Ryan like he’s 14 instead of 34, and you’re trying hard not to laugh because there’s a heaviness in your chest that turns your mind to sorrow but you can’t help it. Not with them around, boisterous boys again, David frowning petulantly because Paul’s hidden his hair gel somewhere. If you blink you might go back to the very beginning.

“Where to now?” Ryan says, getting up and stretching.

“Drinks?” Nicky asks. Paul shrugs.

“Yeah,” you say, hardly daring to hope for more time, but they’re not leaving yet. Not for a bit longer still.

- _you’ve had many friends in your life, and when you got a bit older you’ve even gotten some that weren’t in football. But these boys are still special to you, somehow. They’re the ones you grew up with, whatever that means. The ones who know what you looked like blushing at a pinup of Clayton Blackmore and the ones who know what the city of Barcelona looked like bathed in the dawn light after winning a treble. The ones who know. When you say that you mean nothing else than they’re the ones who know United, and so they know your heart._

You end up going to a pub, then Ryan leads the way to a restaurant, and everywhere you go you’re talking about everything that happened in all the years that separated the six of you. You’ve all had a bit too much to drink, and halfway down a street Phil announces a huddle, so you sling your arm around your brother and pull David closer. Nicky complains weakly, but Paul drags him in without speaking. You’re all giggling too much to stay still.

“Now fucking what?” Ryan says, and that makes you all start laughing. You’re thirty six and too old and laughing like you’re sixteen and half terrified the gaffer was going to find you and haul you back by your ears.

“To Gaz’s,” Phil says, and you’ll probably stay up tonight till the sun rises tomorrow, and maybe then your chest will feel lighter. But all you know now is that you want to keep them all, even Phil, who’s doubly bound to you yet still slipping away; you want to keep this, you’re not sure who you are without them but you would never tell them that, not how much you needed them.

You look at all these boys you grew up with, and you love them, you love them, you do.

 

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> im p sure 1 person is going to read it so my author notes are going to be WILD prepare  
> 1\. this is the most manchester united thing ive ever written and will ever write.  
> 2\. all my united ~feels come from Rachel and possibly accidentally absorbing it from the stone roses.  
> 3\. the idea for this fic happened like a month ago but i didnt write any of it until today when i wrote it in one go with spiked coffee. the spiked coffee kicked in at ryan's bit.  
> 4\. im still kind of not sober right now but im posting it because im kind of proud.  
> 5\. id list my references here but i watched them/read and immediately forgot them and made things up instead EXCEPT FOR gaz's biography which i bookmarked 30 pages of. like, 2 of those pages came in handy.  
> 6\. now that im sobering up i think this might be kind of confusing...............tldr: everyone loves each other in co92  
> 7\. I DO HAVE FEELINGS FOR RYAN GIGGS AND THE BEGINNING QUOTE IS FROM [here](http://www.theguardian.com/football/2013/oct/10/manchester-united-historic-treble-extract) but you know what i hunted down that book and read about 3/5 of it on google books. if you're not a united fan you probably want to just stick with the excerpt. (i found this out after 3/5)  
> 8\. here is where id normally say 'im going on a cleanse' but i think at this point im just accepting my fate.  
> 9\. Rachel is to blame for literally everything.  
> 10\. thank you for reading <3


End file.
